-- THE ARCHIVE --

SINGAPORE

The New Paper, Singapore, 12 April 2009

He poses as cop to prey on women

ELEVEN years ago, on National Day, he ignored his own safety
and chased after a molester.

His call to the police helped them arrest the man who was
later sentenced to jail.

Today, that same hero sits in a prison cell - a fallen angel.

Iskandar Abdul Rahim was 23 when this picture was
taken in 1998 after he had helped an elderly woman who was
molested by a stranger. Now aged 34, he was sent to 8 years of
preventive detention and given 9 strokes of the cane for being a
serial molester.

Ironically, Iskandar Abdul Rahim, now 34, was convicted last
June of the very same crime he had acted against in 1998.

It turned out that he had been a serial sexual predator since
2000, often impersonating a police officer to prey on teenage
girls.

And even after Iskandar was caught and jailed, he went back to
his criminal ways once he was released.

As a recalcitrant offender, he is now in eight years of
preventive detention and still has a rape charge pending.

Back in 1998, life could not have been more different for
Iskandar. Then 23 and working as a project manager for an
interior design company, he was hailed for his
public-spiritedness in helping to nab a molester.

He had seen a man molesting a 79-year-old woman at the void
deck of her block at 3am on 9Aug that year, The Straits Times
reported.

The man, a 36-year-old odd-job labourer, was arrested and
jailed for 15 months and caned six times, in November 1998.

Just months after his heroic deed, Iskandar's downward spiral
began.

He was convicted of impersonating a police officer in March
1999 and August 2000 and was fined a total of $3,800.

He was also convicted in August 2000 of criminal intimidation
and cheating and fined a total of $7,000.

Then in June 2000, his sex crimes came to light when he
attacked two 18-year-old girls in the space of two hours.

Details of Iskandar's crimes were in District Judge Wong Choon
Ning's grounds of decision released in January this year on why
the molester was sentenced to eight years' preventive detention
for crimes committed in 2005 and 2006.

Preventive detention means he is not eligible for early
release.

On 23 Jun 2000, Iskandar's first victim was walking to a
bus-stop after 1am, after being with friends at a billiards hall,
when Iskandar drove up in his car.

Click to enlarge

He invited her for a drink, and she went along. He told her he
was a police officer at Tanglin Police Station from the 'murder
department', and flashed a card with a police logo.

He later drove her to a park where he climbed on top of her
and tried to remove her clothes, while kissing her on her face.

The stunned girl screamed and struggled violently, slapping
and biting him on the shoulder as he molested her.

He finally stopped and took her home, claiming he had recorded
all their conversations that night.

Another victim

Less than two hours later, around 3am, he spotted another
18-year-old girl walking home and followed her into a lift at her
block.

He again flashed his 'police' card and told her to follow him
to his car.

After driving to a park, he claimed he needed to check her
body for tattoos and told her to unbutton her blouse.

She reluctantly complied and he molested her by brushing his
hand against her breast. But she managed to escape and fled in a
taxi.

Iskandar was later arrested and jailed for a total of three
years and seven months and given a total of seven strokes of the
cane for the offences.

He was released in 2003.

Then, on 2 Apr, 2005, he struck again by preying on a drunk
18-year-old student.

She was at a club in the Mohammed Sultan Road area when she
passed out from drinking too much.

Her friends took her to a couch outside the club. They
gradually went back in, leaving two men to look after her.

Iskandar, then a manager at a food court, was loitering around
and saw them.

After one of the men went to the toilet, the girl threw up.
Iskandar went up and claimed to be the girl's friend.

He told the other man to get tissue paper to clean her up and
the latter left.

Iskandar immediately picked up the girl and left.

When both men returned two minutes later, they were horrified
to find her missing.

By then, Iskandar had dumped the girl at the back of his car,
which was parked at the back of the building, and driven off.

But, some passers-by had seen him carrying the girl and
running to his car. One of them became suspicious and memorised
his car's licence plate number.

When he saw the two friends looking for the girl, he told them
what he had seen and one of them called the police.

After parking at a quiet spot, Iskandar told the drunk girl,
'I am your friend', when she asked who he was. He then forcibly
removed her pants and molested her.

A policeman, who had been on the lookout for Iskandar's car,
eventually stopped the car at 3.50am and found her unconscious in
the front passenger seat.

When she did not respond, he called for an ambulance.
Iskandar's semen was later found on her underwear and belt.

Iskandar struck again on 7 July, 2006, when he forcibly kissed
a 22-year-old woman near Bishan Park.

Tricked into stripping

Two months later, he impersonated a Central Narcotics Bureau
officer and tricked a young woman into stripping in his car on
the pretext of searching for drugs.

In November that year, he stole an $11,600 Rolex watch from a
drunk man who had just left a disco.

When he was taken to court, Iskandar claimed trial. He was
convicted on 27 Jun last year.

District Judge Wong sentenced him to eight years of preventive
detention and nine strokes of the cane.

His appeal against the sentence is pending.

He has also been slapped with a fresh charge of raping a woman
in the Sin Ming area on 10 Feb 2008. This case is still pending.

A medical report on Iskandar stated that he has a
financially-secure and supportive family, but he had a problem
with alcohol use.

In mitigation, his lawyer told the court that Iskandar was
remorseful and pleaded for leniency as his wife of five years was
expecting their first child.

His act of bravery in 1998 was also brought up as a mitigating
factor.

When he was asked in an interview then why he wanted to help
people, his reply was: 'I help people because I hope that when
I'm in trouble, others will come and help me.'

'A menace to society'

HE'S a repeat offender and a sexual predator whom the public
must be protected from.

This was deputy public prosecutor (DPP) Ng Cheng Thiam's
argument when he called for preventive detention for Iskandar
Abdul Rahim.

In his grounds of decision, District Judge Wong Choon Ning
noted that Mr Ng had highlighted how Iskandar's modus operandi in
2000 and in his latest offences were similar.

His crimes were of a sexual nature, most of his victims were
about 18 years old, and he would pretend to be a law enforcement
officer.

He would lure his victims into his car with fake promises or
false representations and drive them to a secluded area late at
night where they would have little chance of getting help.

Mr Wong said the prosecution had noted the way in which the
unrepentant and 'cunning' sex predator had planned his attacks
showed he was 'a menace to society who could not be trusted'.

Iskandar had first been represented by Mr John Abraham, then
Ms Gloria James.

Judge Wong agreed that Iskandar was a dangerous man and said
that for the protection of the public, he had to be kept away for
a substantial period of time.

The Straits Times, 15 April 2009

25 years' jail for 'agent of destruction'

Trafficker's claim that he was pawn of drug cartel cuts no ice with judge

By Khushwant Singh

Justice Lee Sieu Kin called Khairul Anwar Zaini 'an agent of destruction' before sentencing him to 25 years in jail and 20 strokes of the cane. --PHOTO: SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE

A DRUG trafficker who painted himself as a pawn
of "a sophisticated and complex drug-smuggling
syndicate" received scant sympathy from the High Court
yesterday.

Khairul Anwar Zaini, 42, declared by Justice Lee Sieu Kin to
be "an agent of destruction", was sentenced to 25 years
in jail and 20 strokes of the cane.

He was at first staring at the hangman's noose, as the amount
of heroin in the 2.5kg stash of drug-laced powder weighed in at
16.53g -- more than the 15g that makes a death sentence
mandatory upon conviction.

But the amount was reduced to 14.99g by the prosecution. No
reason was given.

The construction worker also pleaded guilty to a second charge
of trafficking in 6.43g of heroin in a separate shipment.

Four other charges for trafficking in drugs such as Ice and
Subutex were considered by the judge when imposing the sentence.

Khairul Anwar also admitted to packing the drugs for sale, a
task for which he was paid $4,400 for each kilogram handled.

The High Court heard that businessman Abdul Salam Musthafa
allegedly ordered the heroin from a Malaysian supplier, then
appointed one Maryati Sipon, 27, to go to Johor Bahru on Dec 31,
2007 to make the payment of $30,500.

When the supplier, known only as Boy Cino,
received the money, he got a woman named Jamaliah Yacab, 24, to
bring the goods into Singapore.

Click to enlarge

Central Narcotics Bureau officers trailed
Jamaliah, who was carrying the heroin in a box of detergent,
together with other household items, from the Woodlands
Checkpoint to Block 19 Telok Blangah Crescent, where she passed
the heroin to Khairul Anwar.

She was then arrested.

Khairul Anwar fled, dropping the bags, but was
caught nearby.

His lawyer, asking for the minimum sentence of
20 years, said his client had stayed "clean" since
2002, when he completed a prison term for a previous drug
conviction.

But Khairul Anwar was having difficulty supporting his two
ex-wives, four children, his present girlfriend and her three
children on his monthly salary of $1,000, added his lawyer. So he
agreed to be a trafficker, but on an understanding with Boy Cino
that the amounts of the drug would be small.

Justice Lee, noting that Khairul Anwar had
missed the threshold for capital punishment by the skin of his
teeth, said he had given into to the lure of easy money and had
become an agent of destruction: "You have destroyed lives and
also exposed your own children to drugs."

Khairul Anwar's brother and two sisters were
seen weeping in court. One of the sisters said: "We are sad
he is to be jailed for such a long time but are thankful he was
spared the death sentence."

Jamaliah and Maryati pleaded guilty to drug
trafficking on Monday and will be sentenced in two weeks' time.

The Straits Times, Singapore, 25 April 2009

Serial sex predator jailed for 32 years

Judge sentences him to 24 strokes as well; his victims were
children

From 2007 to last July, Huang assaulted nine young girls aged between nine
and 14.

FOR 16 months, a full-time national serviceman trailed girls
aged as young as nine into lifts, threatened them with a
penknife, then forced them to secluded spots where he sexually
assaulted them.

Yesterday, Huang Shiyou, 22, paid the price for his crime
spree around his Tampines neighbourhood between April 2007 and
July last year: 32 years' jail and 24 strokes of the cane.

He had pleaded guilty to five charges -- for aggravated
molest, sexual assault and attempted rape -- involving two of
his nine victims, a nine-year-old primary school pupil and a
14-year-old secondary school student.

Yesterday, his lawyer, Mr Chia Kok Seng, acknowledged the
severity of the offences, but pleaded for leniency. He portrayed
his client as a good person who crumbled under depression from a
failed relationship and had problems adjusting to life in the
army.

But Justice Chan Seng Onn was unmoved, and said a long deterrent
sentence was justified to protect the public against serial sex
offenders.

Said the judge: "Words cannot sufficiently describe the
extent of the trauma, suffering and distress that you have caused
to the very young victims of the horrendous sexual crimes."

Justice Chan agreed with Deputy Public Prosecutor Shahla Iqbal
that Huang had deliberately and systematically targeted young
victims and used a penknife to frighten them into submission.

Click to enlarge

In passing sentence, the judge took into consideration nine other
charges involving seven other victims aged nine to 13.

Huang, who has no criminal history, stared blankly into space
when he heard his sentence. With two-thirds remission for good
behaviour, he will be in jail until he is 43.

His first four victims were molested while they were in a lift
with him.

He made some other victims follow him to staircase landings,
where he groped them, forced them to perform oral sex on him and
tried to rape them.

His ninth and final victim was an 11-year-old whom he
threatened to harm with a penknife if she did not follow his
instructions.

She managed to escape being violated -- the court was not
told how -- and made a police report.

Based on her description of her assailant, officers searched the
vicinity of the crime scene and arrested Huang, who was carrying
a sling bag containing a penknife and a cap, that same day.

A government psychiatrist said Huang had a chronic adjustment
disorder with depressed moods.

Yesterday, Mr Chia said: "He is a fundamentally good person
who can be rehabilitated and contribute to society upon his
release from prison."

He said his client never recovered from a failed relationship
with his first girlfriend when he was 17. The romance had
affected his schoolwork and strained his relationship with his
family.

Unable to deal with the emotional blow when she dumped him, Huang
attempted suicide several times.

During his days as a corporal in national service, Mr Chia said,
Huang had to work very long hours with very little rest.

Said Mr Chia: "Shiyou did his best and no one suspected he
was having emotional and family problems. He quietly dealt with
depression alone."

But, the DPP shot back, "in life, we go through periods of
depression, but we do not embark on a crime spree of 16
months".

Huang, she said, had repeatedly terrorised young victims taking
lifts on their way home. Also, the police had to expend
considerable resources to bring him to justice.